Month

The pace of drilling in Pennsylvania has declined by 35% in the first month and a half of 2013 compared to the same period in 2012, but counties rich in liquids and oil are faring better.

Maryland lawmakers voted Thursday to approve a bill that enables utility companies to impose a surcharge on customers of up to $2/month to pay for repair and replacement of aging pipe and distribution lines.

A bill that would enable Maryland’s natural gas utilities to impose a monthly surcharge on customers of up to $2.00/month to pay for maintaining and replacing aging distribution lines appears likely to be approved by the legislature as soon as this week.

Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) will undertake a 12-14 month comprehensive study of naturally occurring levels of radioactivity in by-products of oil and natural gas development, the agency said Thursday.

Royal Dutch Shell plc and Qatar Petroleum provided a natural gas-based jet fuel to Qatar Airways earlier this month for the first commercial flight from Qatar’s Doha International to London Heathrow.

A total of 205 horizontal wells were drilled in Ohio’s Utica Shale through Jan. 5, and seven more were drilled in the state’s portion of the Marcellus Shale , according to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR).

Goodrich Petroleum Corp. said Thursday it plans to spend between $175 million and $200 million on capital expenditures (capex) in 2013, most of which will go toward drilling for oil in the Eagle Ford Shale and Tuscaloosa Marine Shale (TMS), but a small portion will be spent on dry gas in the Haynesville Shale.

Higher natural gas and oil resource estimates should continue through 2013 for several onshore unconventional areas, especially in “pockets of the Permian Basin,” the Niobrara formation, as well as the Eagle Ford and “super-rich” Marcellus and Utica shales, according to Credit Suisse.

An 11-month investigation into an Alberta drilling mishap has confirmed that hydraulic fracturing (fracking) poses a unique fluid spill risk and prompted regulatory steps to control the danger.